Karumba to Einasleigh River

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Karumba to Einasleigh Bridge.
Leaving Karumba by 8.30am, odometer 94262 kms, temperature 16 degrees, a sunny morning, we travelled back to Normanton after passing approximately a 100 cyclists, riding for prostate cancer out of Cairns.
We did not stop at Normanton but continued East on the Savannah Way to a small road/train stop called Black Bull Siding. This is where the Gulf Lander once stopped to give refreshments of tea and cake. The plaque informed us of the engineering feats to bet floods and wood eating termite destroying the rail line.
Toiletted, we were back on our way until we reached Croydon.
Croydon was once the third largest town in Queensland, with the lucrative strike of gold in 1885 came the gold rush. The 18km goldfield produced 23,675kg of gold over 35 years of blood sweat and intrigue, until the gold ran out.
The town has conserved its heritage and reinvented it's self as a tourist attraction. The old buildings preserved, we visited the True Blue visitor information centre and took in the sculpture garden and heritage houses.
We visited the oldest, continually running store in Queensland, built in 1894.
The Hotel was built in1887 and is the last of the 36 hotels that were once in town.
Four Kilometrrs North West of the town we travelled to Belmore Lake for a lunch stop.
The Lake Park was established as a government resilience wellbeing project. Croydon in the past 10 years has suffered severe floods, drought and bush fires. The Lake is stocked with Barramundi for recreation fishing, however with the extra extra dry season the lake is well below normal levels. In town we purchased fuel at 1.38cents per litre.

Departing Croydon at 1315hrs we travelled further east to Georgetown. Situated west of the Newcastle Range it is the centre of the Etheridge Goldfield which still yields gold and semi-precious stones, including topaz, quartz, spiel, garnet, cairngorm, aquamarine and sapphires
The area is known as 'poor mans goldfield'. Here we had coffee and milkshakes for afternoon tea and visited the TerrEstrial Information Centre and the Ted Elliot Mineral Collection.
An incredible array of over 4500 minerals, gemstones and fossils.
TerrEstrial meaning of the Earth.
Unable to stay in the booked out Undarra Caraban Park we travelled 53km metres east to the Einasleigh Bridge were we Peter tying to be clever got us bogged in the river sand at the base of the bridge.
A nice spot to camp, large open fire and dinner of cod fish curry, rice and chocolate for dessert. We enjoyed our camp fire games and settled in for the night.

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